so our trip to st. george the day after christmas felt a little crazy to get all packed up and ready for, christmas all cleaned up, someone to take care of the cat . . . not gonna lie, it was a little hectic and trav and i both agreed that we would probably wait for a couple more days next time!😂 it was really good when we got back though because we came home on a wednesday and didn't have to go back to work/school until the next monday, so we had a few days to recover! which was AMAZING and something we've never really done before! i feel like we're always cramming as much fun as possible in a little time-period and then running our guts out til we get home at midnight, and then we go back to everything the next day and it's crazy and we're exhausted! so this was pretty awesome and i'm so happy that we all had so much time together! trav has his curtailment, i'm on blackfoot's student break, and then our kids have their break and it worked out that we all had almost 2 weeks off! so sweet!!!! so we started our trip off on a thursday and tried to just get up and hit the road, which we did pretty well at. i think we left at about 9-10ish and ended up getting to st. george about 5-6ish. we got settled into our hotel and a bite to eat and that was that!
we weren't really sure what our plans were for our first day, we were thinking of just hanging around st. george and maybe hiking around a little bit but the weather was kind of crusty! we ended up going on one little hike to this petroglyph site, and then decided to see if it was a little warmer down in las vegas!;) we had been to this little black mountain petroglyph site before, but i didn't remember it very well! i think it was cold and we had to hurry so it wasn't very memorable the first time, Lol! but we had all the time we wanted this time so we hiked around and let the kids climb around on the rocks (that didn't have petroglyphs on them, Lol!!) and we ended up spending quite a bit of time there and it was really fun!
i never get tired of finding petroglyphs, trav and i both love them, but the kids's favorite part is climbing on all the rocks! they loved it!
there are a couple areas like this where there are just big boulders everywhere with petroglyphs on them and you can just kind of go wherever, and they're 2 of my favorite hikes ever! i hope people will keep them nice so they can be enjoyed forever because it's not very often that they're not roped off and you can get right up to them! there were some super cool petroglyphs here and the sign said there are over 500 in the area up to 8,000 years old! that's a lot of old petroglyphs!
there were some pretty high rocks to climb and the kids had a blast! this one that aiden climbed up was way up there!😂
this was one of the coolest rocks!
after our petroglyph hike, we decided it was a little chilly there that day and thought it might be a good day to head down to las vegas! we've driven down the strip a couple times on our way to other places, but we'd never actually taken the kids to las vegas to spend any time so we thought it would be fun to spend the rest of our day down there!
the monorail is pretty much the sweetest thing ever built because those vegas blocks are SO HUGE to walk! so we got tickets to ride it around the strip and the kids thought it was the greatest thing ever!😂 and it was til someone lost 2 of our tickets . . . i won't name any names but i told aiden he couldn't have them because he would lose them and made him give them to who i thought was the older, wiser, more responsible male in the family . . . and guess what happened . . . yep. he lost 'em. and i'm pretty sure i have been more irate in my life😂 i was fit to be tied and wanted to bag the rest of the day, but was talked into buying 2 more (might as well have lit $30 on fire and watched it burn) . . . but i'm glad trav smoothed out my ruffled feathers and we kept going because it ended up being probably the most memorable for the kids after we kept going. Lol!!!
i feel like there's soooo much crap to do in vegas that it's almost impossible to even know where to start, Lol!! you just have to pick something and GO! so that's what we did, we picked ceasar's palace because there was supposed to be a cool show in there to see.
the thing i loved most about being in vegas this time of year was all the decorations! i can't even begin to imagine how much time and money went in to putting up all the christmas trees, lights, and decorations but it had to have been a lot! there were trees and lights everywhere! this one was in the ceasar's palace and it was the hugest christmas tree i've ever seen! it was cool!:)
the fountain of the gods. super cool!
this was the show, it was about the city of atlantis and a fight for the kingdom, there was water spraying and fire, it was pretty cool. lynlee said it was too scary though😂 our sweet little lynners, she's such a fragile flower sometimes😂 but always so precious!
one thing we knew we needed to find was some GELATO!!!! we were so disappointed because the first stand we found was ridiculous, a large was $35! we were like, what?! no way in HECK!!!! so we kept going and found another one that was normally priced so we snagged us all some delicious gelato, yay! before we had any of our kiddos and when we lived in st. george, one of our favorite things to do was to go down to the venetian and get gelato, it was so fun! and crepes at the paris! yummo! we might have to go back and get some crepes next time!!!
the mirage was all decorated and cute so we had to get a few pics of their cute penguins and christmas trees:) and these cute kiddos! colton was unable to look and smile normally this whole day, he's such a pain!!!😂
out on the grounds of the mirage, it was pretty!
aiden had to have a picture in the beatles bus!!!! and then so did everyone else;)
so all of that was before the whole someone-lost-our-tickets-fiasco, and then after we bought more and stuck around, we went to the m&m store, coke store, and hershey's store. see what i mean? totally the most memorable Lol!!! the kids had a blast and they were really fun to go in!
i don't remember why lynlee was so mad in this pic but . . . whoa! if looks could kill, eh lynnles?! so cute still though!😂
this was a racecar that was in the m&m store too, that place was huge! it was 4 floors high!
there was a 3D movie in there too that we went to, it was pretty fun:)
this was super funny, there was this game machine that you could play and then it took a picture of you that you could go get online and download. so we let the kids play the game and then we hopped in for the picture, it was so funny!
next up was the coke store which is always fun!
and then across the street to the hershey's store! which i think is new, i'm pretty sure that hasn't always been there! and of course i had to stop for a pic of the christmas decorations again, this giant deer was cool!
the hershey's store was fun, we hadn't ever been there before! i don't know it it just wasn't there until recently or if we just never knew about it or cared, but i didn't remember it ever being there!
oh my gosh, can you just see the mischief?! Lol!!!😂
i still love the excaliber! it's still so cool looking even after all these years!
i love this one of sadie laughing, i don't remember what trav was doing, probably pretending to push her into the river if i had to guess, but it's cute💓😆
this was just a cute swing by the little river that we sat in for a minute
they even built this "slot canyon" which was really cool, and it led to these windows that you could see the fish swimming in the water through, but they were a little bit hard to see. we found a few though!
these were some fossilized dinosaur tracks that were really cool too!
we met up with kristie and went to the new rec center by her house and the kids swam some MORE, i have no idea how Lol . . . but they loved it!😂
this was really cool, lynlee conquered this water slide!!!! i was AMAZED and so proud of her!!! i didn't think in a million years that she would want to go down that, but she asked if she could and in my mind was like . . . um, NO!!! that looks terrifying and can you even touch?! and that water is moving fast!!! PANIC, PANIC, PANIC!!!!😂
but sadie was there with her and was like, mom i'll go first and stay close so that if she has any trouble then i'm right there, and i was like . . . oh my gosh, i don't know if i can do this . . . ok. YES! please don't let her drown!!!😂
and i mean, there was a lifeguard there too, and i was completely ready to jump in there fully clothed if i had to so . . . i knew she'd be ok. i just didn't know that she'd go down it AND TOTALLY ROCK IT LIKE A ROCK STAR!!!! she came shooting out of there, put her head in the water, and SWAM!!!! it was incredible!!! YAY LYNLEE!!!! those summer swimming lessons that took you almost all of them to even dunk your head in did so much more than i ever imagined😂 really though, i know they helped her so much even if it seemed like there was very slow progress, it paid off in dividends to see her do this that day! we even recorded it and sent it to grandma ruby, and lynlee can't wait to show her swimming lessons coach, and gr. ruby's friend, vickie, she was sooo proud!!! and so was i, way to be freaking awesome lynns!!!!
i wasn't sure if i got a pic of the rec center pool so i made colton stand in front of it after they were done . . . he didn't really want to😂
this was just a cool tractor in front of this restaurant we wanted to try! it was a little bit different but pretty good! except trav's salad, it was kind of sad
after din din at the hash house, we decided to try st. george's equivalent to the drink factory, swig! i had heard a lot about it but had never been there! we got some drinks and cookies and i decided that i definitely like my diet medium bombshell better, but their cookies were really good! i love this picture of the kids messing around in the back, it cracked me up😂
we heard that the temple visitor center was still doing their nativity so we went over to check it out.
it was all decorated and nice, and we got to watch this year's christmas video and then go see the nativity. it was really cool and a nice reminder why we really celebrate the season!
i loved this christmas tree with the temple in the background! . . aiden's sideways hat and gang signing . . . not so much. Lol!!! kids are such pains! all a mom wants is a nice picture and they have to go ruining it with all their teenage nonsense!😂
ah . . much better!😂
i loved the christus with the christmas trees in the background! we sat in the chairs here for awhile, it was so nice!
best kids and best daddy ever! i love my little crew so much!!!
the littles were getting a little bit tired by then, colton had already fallen asleep during the christmas video, it was so funny! poor little man was beat! we had to pack him around for awhile because he kept sleeping even after we left the nativity video, but he eventually woke back up😂
this is how our drives usually look!😂 lots of entertainment to keep the fighting and whining to a minimum, Lol!😂 i actually feel like they do pretty good, we've taught them from a young age to be little road warriors! we love our road trips!
i'm so sad this one got so washed out, but it was still so cute!
we had heard that there was a new thunder junction park that was fun so we tracked it down and it was so cute!
it was dino themed and had all sorts of cute things for the kids! i loved the "it's a good day to have a good day" sign . . how adorable is that?!
there were zip lines, spinners, all sorts of dino things to play on, swings, teeter totters . . .
even a super cute splash pad!
colton informed us that this dino was barfing out his mouth and nose . . . 😂😂😂 nice one pal, that's not gross or anything, Lol!!!
lynlee and sadie loved this climbing wall, i couldn't believe lynlee was even interested in the least bit, it was pretty high! but she rocked it and went multiple times . . . maybe she's more of a little daredevil than i thought!!
this "volcano" rumbled and steamed out the top every 45 minutes, it was super cute!
they waited so long to get a turn on this thing😂 it was cute though!
and the swings, colton and lynlee loved the big red ones and were probably in there for a half hour!😂
oh i love this little boy! love you forever colty buddies!!!
one of the things we don't always do when we go to st. george is go to pioneer park, so it had been awhile since we had been there but we thought the kids would like it . . . which they did so much, they had SOOOO much fun!!!!
the park had been developed a TON since we had been there last and there was a small road and multiple parking lots with lots of places to climb, so there could be a ton of people out there and you wouldn't even notice, which i'm pretty sure there was this day but you never would have known! each parking area has tons of places around it to climb and play on, so there's not much of a need to overlap and you just kind of hang out in your own little area, it was cool! so much more fun than it used to be! this was one of the nicer days that we were there, it was around 50 or a little higher and the sun was shining! . . such a welcome contrast from the single digit nights we'd been having in idaho . . . i don't even know why we live there sometimes, Lol!!!😂
this was the "dinosaur head" and the big kids wanted to climb into its "eyeball" Lol!!! it looked precarious from the ground but looked pretty easy as they climbed around up there! and we laughed that it seriously could have been a fossilized dinosaur head, it seriously looked exactly like one!😂
we all had so much fun! what a beautiful day!
nap time for sadie!😂
this little arch was super cool!
lynlee looks like the little mermaid!😂
oh how much we love you our little lynnles! it's not all the time that your kids proclaim their love for you with a dirt clod on a park bench . . . so sweet!😂💓 i think we have the best family too, lynns!!
after pioneer park, we went out to see some of our old friends from when we lived there. we had both gone our separate ways for quite a few years, but they had recently moved back to st. george and we were able to catch up with them on new years!
we went over for dinner and games for the evening and all had such a blast! the kids had a nerf gun war and the adults played games, it was a lot of fun and so fun to see our friends again! they're kids' ages were really close to our kids' so they were all able to play and had a lot of fun!
this was me being the most excited i have been in so so long because they had an ORIGINAL nintendo!!! we have a super nintendo, but the original is just so sweet! i got to play my all time favorite, BUBBLE BOBBLE!!! i am quite sure i need this now . . . 😂
i guess this is called bumper pool or something? the kids think they need it now too😂
games with josh and jennifer!
colton really liked this dartboard . . . we got some really good ideas for our "party bin"!!!! or house or hut . . . whatever it ends up being!!!😂
sadie riding her hoverboard in the halls of the hotel! Lol!! they loved their hoverboards so much! it ended up being a lot of fun to bring them along, even if the little kids' scooters are a little peppy and colton tried a couple times and then was like, NOPE . . . i'm sure they'll get the hang of them!
this whole trip was so much fun (except the part when the van tried to break down and strand us down there!!! luckily we have an amazing mechanic who was able to patch it back up after about 14 hours of work between 2 of the days we were there! the funny thing is, i bet the kids won't even remember that part . . . big deal for us, not even noticed by kids . . aaaaand that's why it sucks to be an adult!!!😂) oh well! trav saved the day again, he's always doing that because he's AWESOME and we had such a fun trip. it gets harder and harder to come back each time we go down there, there's just something about those red rocks! and it still just feels like home! we showed the kids our first apartment and our townhouse, and told them about how we moved down there with no plans, no jobs, and like, $50 in our bank account . . . and then told them not to do that . . . Lol!!!!😂😂😂 but seriously?! i'm not sorry we did!😂 we're a little bit crazy like that and have never been afraid of an adventure! so goodbye for now st. george, we will miss you until we see you again . . . which won't be long, i'm sure . . !!!!
HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!!! 2020 WILL BE AMAZING!!!!
